Microsoft's intent with the Surface tablets is to create hardware that puts the software front and center, to provide the hardware necessary to allow Windows 8's strengths to really come to the foreground. At the launch event, however, the software took the back seat. This was all about the hardware and with good reason.

The Surface tablets are smart, good-looking, carefully considered, well-built, slick pieces of kit, and there's nothing even close on the market today. Of course, they're not on the market today either, but unless the PC OEMs inject a serious dose of quality in their build and design processes, the Surface units will stand alone when they eventually go on sale.

Microsoft still isn't ready to let Joe Public get their grubby little hands on Surface. At the press event, we were given a number of demonstrations, shown a number of non-functional demo units, and given scant few seconds to touch real working devices. The Intel Core i5-powered Surface for Windows 8 Pro devices were not on display, either; only the ARM-powered Surface for Windows RT was available. However, the major design points are common between the two.

Surface for Windows RT's basic specs set the scene. It's 9.3mm thick, has a mass of 676 grams, and sports a 10.6" 1366×768 screen. That puts it in the same size and weight ballpark as the iPad, though with a lower resolution 16:9 screen instead of the iPad's high-resolution 4:3 display. From a size and portability perspective, the Surface gets it right, but that's not unique.

What makes Surface special is the attention to detail. The standard of the fit and finish of the prototypes on display was extremely high. The shell of the Surface is made of cast magnesium, with a vapor-deposited finish called VaporMg. The result is an attractive, scratch-resistant finish that's easy to grip and comfortable to hold.

The company explained that its casting and finishing process allows it to create edges as thin as 0.65mm—less than the thickness of a credit card—and that these narrow castings and tight tolerances are essential to the device. Put a piece of sticky tape inside the Surface when you assemble it, and the finished product will bulge, it's so tightly packed together.

The design element that the company drew most attention to was the kickstand. On the face of it, it seems almost silly to make a kickstand the unique selling point of a device. There's no denying the practicality of a built-in stand: you can put the Surface on a table and watch a movie without having to prop it up, and without having to use a separate stand. It makes a lot of sense.

The small chamfer on the edge allows easy opening of the kickstand.

And this is one high quality kickstand. It's an integrated part of the system's shell. It fits flush when closed, feels sturdy when opened, and makes a reassuring click as it settles into place. It apparently took dozens of iterations to get the right sound. It does a good job of propping up the screen.

Another feature that was mentioned repeatedly was an angle; 22 degrees. The edges of the device are all chamfered at 22 degrees, an angle that Microsoft says makes the hardware fade into the background and comfortable to hold (though we'd have to have a lot more time with it to see if that's really true in practice). The kickstand also holds the screen at 22 degrees.

On its own, the angle is no big deal. But the attention to detail comes into play. The Surface has front and rear cameras. The rear camera isn't, however, mounted so that it looks out perpendicular to the case. It's angled at 22 degrees too, so that when using the kickstand, the cameras looks straight out, rather than down.

If the company was pleased with the kickstand, it was positively boastful about the Surface's pair of combination keyboard-covers. There's the Touch Cover, available in five colors (gray, white, blue, pink, and orange), which integrates a multitouch keyboard into a 3mm thick screen cover, and the Type Cover, which integrates a real keyboard with keyswitches into a slightly thicker cover.

The Touch Cover has no keyswitches. It's based on pressure sensors, with the "keys" distinguished from each other with a different texture. There's plenty of smarts in the Touch Cover. Touch typists tend to rest their fingers on the home row. With a naive touch keyboard, that results in a lot of stray key presses. The pressure applied during real keypresses is different, however, from that of resting on the home row, and the logic in the keyboard can tell the difference.

The keyboards also include gyroscopes so they can tell when they've been folded back behind the Surface, disabling them when tucked out the way.

How well does all this cleverness work? That we don't know. Microsoft says that the Touch Cover allows typing speeds twice as fast as those possible on glass, but until we can actually use one, the company's claim is untested.

Both covers connect to the Surface with a satisfyingly solid magnetic connector. It's designed to mate automatically without requiring careful alignment, and that certainly worked well.

The magnetic connector snaps together with ease.

Microsoft's Surface for Windows RT looks good and feels good. Does it have what it takes to take on the iPad? That's harder to say. We don't know how well the technology works in practice. Nor do we know how much the thing will cost, with Microsoft saying only that it will be priced "competitively." But if it can deliver on its promise, Microsoft should have a winner on its hands.

Can't help remembering that The Internet said much the same about the original iPad ... before it went on sale.

One thing I really want to know:The WinRT tablet is 1366x768 (148dpi), but the pro version is specced as having a 'Full HD' display, which would imply a higher res, so what is it exactly? 19x10 on a 10.6" screen is 208dpi, which is reasonable, though falls short of Apple's offering.

A landscape-only tablet. Aargh! It is just a Windows laptop with a touchscreen. Why limit it to this single function instead of embracing both?

That's was just a bit of poor presentation. Windows has supported different screen orientations for years. You have have it landscape, landscape upside down, portrait to the left and portrait to the right. I've yet to see any use of any other orientations (save for a Cowon J3 UI),

This does require graphics drivers, at least on older Windows, but I think they built in now. RT might not have it, but I'd be very surprised if that is the case. x86 (or the Pro) definitely will as I tested Windows 8 on my TabletPC and it has all four orientations.

I meant the physical proportions of the screen means it is effectively only usable landscape not that the OS does not support flipping. I have tried using a 16:9 as 9:16. It is not fun. Trouble is, it is only fractionally not fun. Even a bump to 16:10 could make it killer.

This has been what I have expected from a company shipping with Ubuntu or Fedora for a long time! Something lightweight, sturdy and with enough grunt to do basic daily tasks.

This is definitely going to have Microsoft's UEFI secure boot architecture all over it, so I would presume it starts with finding a distro that will be tablet friendly and have a certificate for the bootloader/kernel

Optimistic a bit? No UEFI. Windows OS only. They will never let anything else on it.

Reasoning? Okay UEFI is glorified DOS. Windows is glorified UI on glorified DOS. Fast boot means mostly booted system that is leaving most of the data in the flash. Not a big guess since some tablets are doing that already. All that totals up to MS tablet = Windows Only.

Any idea as to why Microsoft didn't publish prices and release date(s)?

Why not wait with this announcement until that information was known?

(this is speculation, but ...)

(1) Get in with great design before the next iDevice(2) Get in with great design before the rumoured Nexus tablet(3) Keep mum on price so the competition can't just casually undercut. The WinRT Surface is probably similar hardware to a Galaxy Tab; the Win8 Pro Surface is probably similar to the Samsung Series 7 11" tablet PC. "Competitive" pricing means just that.

More likely this is Microsoft just doing their normal job of messing things up.

3-a cannot pin down price yet so keep quiet.3-b enough memory and storage will drive the price over $1k, no need to tell them that yet.4 All those tablet PC hardware guys that are actual technology partners. Screw them. SOP.4-a let's get all those customers to stop buying any tablet PC while waiting for the real one. Like the Osborne did.5 Get some comedian to do something with shoes for the actual reveal.

Just remember Microsoft and delivery times.This is a rumored product. No dates, no prices, vapor until it ships.

I happen to be in the business of selling 18+ visual novels for Windows, aka "hentai" games. While I have to say these devices look attractive, Microsoft's stated goal of having no software that they don't sell to you, is a serious issue, since like all other corporate overlords, there will be no pr0n of any kind allowed. I know I am apt to care more than the average person, but isn't a a huge problem with "walled garden" platforms take over, so that corporations essentially close off an entire sector of free speech?

Interested in your thoughts.

That's what Internet and the HTML5 revision is for! Haven't you been updating your business to the open standard allowing you to reach all users on all devices (no matter the make or model)?

Just remember Microsoft and delivery times.This is a rumored product. No dates, no prices, vapor until it ships.

Unfortunately this is one of the most annoying issue competitors haven't improved upon, after Apple's rise to market importance...Seeing how Apple only announce products when they're ready to ship, every other company feels ridiculous and borders on manipulation announcing anything since final release only happens months later, when the specs have lost their relevance.

I remember all the Nvidia Tegra promises, but in the end Apple shipping products tend to keep the graphics crown, while building a huge apps library, that seems difficult to counter.

It's all about the hardware and no mention of the display (beyond a resolution)? How about the viewing angles of the display? Isn't that one of the most important quality aspects of a tablet device? More important than a kick stand design?

Besides, do I really want to shoot photos while the device is on its kickstand? How about a pop-out camera that swivels? Or one that folds like the display of many SLR cameras (and folds flat into the surface)? That would be actual innovations!

Also, how about a tablet where the screen is on a hinge and can be folded up in a kick stand mode? That way the hot electronics could get some extra surface to dissipate heat and could run faster in that mode.

How about the kick stand having two positons, one that puts the device on a slight angle to type on and look less straight down, the other in a viewing position? Just fold the kick stand over and fold out a second inlay that holds the device in the angled flat postion. Many small laser printers have such a double fold out to hold the printed paper.

Also, how about a tablet where the screen is on a hinge and can be folded up in a kick stand mode? That way the hot electronics could get some extra surface to dissipate heat and could run faster in that mode.

Optimistic a bit? No UEFI. Windows OS only. They will never let anything else on it.

Reasoning? Okay UEFI is glorified DOS. Windows is glorified UI on glorified DOS. Fast boot means mostly booted system that is leaving most of the data in the flash. Not a big guess since some tablets are doing that already. All that totals up to MS tablet = Windows Only.

Hmm interesting, and I hope they can finally come up with something successful, really I do.

One question though. Isn't this actually tied into using this on a desktop and not on the move? How will a 'soft' smart cover work on the move? Typing on your lap for example. I'm assuming there's a virtual keyboard as well?

You see if this is the case then there are already 2 ways of using this (smart cover / virtual keyboard), not good.

I meant the physical proportions of the screen means it is effectively only usable landscape not that the OS does not support flipping. I have tried using a 16:9 as 9:16. It is not fun. Trouble is, it is only fractionally not fun. Even a bump to 16:10 could make it killer.

Ah, sorry for the misunderstanding. 9:16 isn't fun at all. 16:10/10:16 isn't bad, but with OneNote it's still annoying. We're not going to be getting 4:3 back though. =(

Can't help remembering that The Internet said much the same about the original iPad ... before it went on sale.

One thing I really want to know:The WinRT tablet is 1366x768 (148dpi), but the pro version is specced as having a 'Full HD' display, which would imply a higher res, so what is it exactly? 19x10 on a 10.6" screen is 208dpi, which is reasonable, though falls short of Apple's offering.

However at the time there was no tablet size device, while right now not only that consumers who wanted one/realized to want one have it already, and can have one with higer res screen than this unreleased MS tablet offers plus a myriad of Android options if they really need something in this form factor but cheaper.

MS are late and other than the "fit and finish" - that are they bringing to the table? Win 8 - sucessful because of desktop application ecosystem? All in all a niche device, odds on to be outsold significantly by iOS and Android based devices.

Who in the world other than a corporate IT manager (or government) would be giddy over a Windows tablet?

I'm sure there are a few, but I can't see people wanting to line up outside of storefronts to snatch them up.

Apple sells their products based on their brand name as much as their implementation. Microsoft and Windows outside of the aforementioned markets is as exciting to consumers as SEARS. That is....boring. The XBox seems to be the exception, but that product is specifically stripped of all the windows marketing that goes with everything else MS makes.

Microsoft has a PERCEPTION problem. Yes, they could make better consumer products but their perception issue is the result of 30 years of Karmic buildup. If they want to compete with Apple, they need to take a putty knife and scrape Ballmer, Gates and "The Microsoft Way" from corporate ethos. Otherwise nobody outside of gaming which is practically a separate company is going to regard them as a creator of "cool" products that can compete with the Zeitgeist of Appleness.

Looks interesting, and it's great that MS finally has a credible plan, but a some things have me wondering:

- How did MS get around Apple's MagSafe patent, particularly this part:

"31. The electronic device of claim 25, wherein the at least three distinct paths of electrical communication comprise: a signal path for signals between the electronic device and the electrical relation; a forward path for direct current power between the electronic device and the electrical relation; and a return path for direct current power between the electronic device and the electrical relation."

Seems like if MS's connector has +5V (or whatever DC voltage) and Ground pins on it, plus some signal / data lines, it is covered by the patent. Did MS somehow manage to convince Apple to license MagSafe?

- How real will Office on this be? I hope that at least it will be upgradable "starter" crippleware like the version that ships on many netbooks. If it isn't real Office, or upgradable, then I'm a whole lot less interested in this product.

- Those ship dates sound risky, particularly given MS's penchant for shipping a month or three late. It could well be that Samsung will have a lower-priced clone out before this model ships, and it is very easy to imagine that Apple will announce (and perhaps even ship) the next generation iPad before MS actually ships the Pro model. Will this model actually be available (as in buyable through major retailers) before the holidays? Overall, I can't help but feel that this is a case of MS aiming at where the puck is, not where it will be by the time these tablets actually ship, which is dog's years away.

- I'm very curious about the actual pricing, and how MS will manage to make a profit (or minimize loss) at a competitive price while still shipping in quantity and on time, particularly given the stunning economies of scale that the primary competitors Apple and Samsung enjoy. It's hard to compete when the other guy can buy some parts at half the price you pay and has -all- the supply lines for other parts completely booked up.

Function vs cost, you can drop one of these on a users desk for roughly the same as a laptop, but its running costs will be lower (lower power usage, lower cooling needs), a desktop worth of work power, but double the portability of a laptop.

Xbox Live - the gaming portal that MS has already said its spreading multiplatform (windows for games is now part of Live), android games with Xbox labelling and branding. Not too far of a stretch to see gaming on this platform (its got key/mouse), even if its 'only' xbox/360 games, which are on what 7-10 year old hardware. Of course it depends on whats driving the graphics hardware,that thin and light and `cheap` I cant imagine theyve snuck a 7990 or 680TI in there.

Microsoft comes out with a tablet that works with the inputs we've come to expect on a laptop while the iPad boasts almost fully functional dictation.

I know I'm being sarcastic but it's as if Microsoft decided to compete with the iPad by making the tablet seem like something older than competing with the iPad by making something that's newer. I'm sure it will find a niche and will probably destroy what's left of the netbook and ultra book markets, but it kind of misses what the point of tablets are as mass market devices. Or, at least, doesn't advance that notion and as such capture mindshare.

So it's an ASUS Transformer with a floppy keyboard. I throw out the stylus, it feels too 1990's to me. Although they would be good for places like doctor's offices, warehouses, those type environments.

Problem is: I don't know if I want it to succeed: if it does, then MS will continue of it's path to destroy the desktop and that will force me to move to another platform.

I like gadgets as much as the next geek but Metro, touch-centric UIs and tablets simply aren't the right tool for my job (and calling me a dinosaur and pretending that the problem my customer are facing are just in their head and that they would all be better with tablet and touch device isn't going to help).

I'm not sure what your job is, but as far as tablet or small PCs, win8 (pro, not RT) is pretty good at offering your standard experience. Well...aside from the start.er...screen? Still not sure what to call it. I suspect that part will be confusing until you get used to it.

I don't see this type of thing taking over development machines, but I could see it replacing standard laptops. If I traveled a lot, i wouldn't mind one. Or if my workload consisted of outlook, word, powerpoint, and excell.

I'm a programmer and sysadmin.

As a programmer, the metro stuff is useless: I can't code in that and wouldn't want to. Furthermore, I write programs that handles real data, not email or light stuff like that. It means that I need to provide complex screen to my users where the main mode of control alternate between the keyboard (for data input screens) and mouse (for data manipulation screen). It's not that touch doesn't have its place anywhere in this, it's just that keyboard or mouse just are more efficient. In that world, Metro just brings limitations to the UI without providing any advantage.

I've been in several brainstorming session with the rest of my team because the guys from marketing wants to surf on MS's publicity and push forward a Metro interface. While we found a few things where we could put Metro to good use (and sometimes it would even actually be a realy nice improvement) overall, we failed to manage to find anything that had to do with the core of the application, where users spend 99% of their time.

I'm in an unfortunate situation: many of my customers will buy new machines with Windows 8 loaded so we have no choice but support it. Sadly, what MS is offering is simply not an OS geared toward doing real work: it's designed to ease your access to captive social platforms and for media playback.

Maybe we'll just shift to a full web version in the future so we can easily switch our recommendations from MS to a web browser (although we'll stay bound to the Windows platform for the server side stuff: Metro on 2012 server is even more useless than on a client system but it's easier to ignore/bypass and the core of the new OS really has great stuff in it).

If the kickstand had been included on the iPad, all heck would break loose because Apple was arrogant to put such a thing in the design. Only a dictator of taste would make such a point about the 22 degree angle. They should let case designers determine such angles for their cases.

And what the heck is this about forcing people to use that single keyboard?

The keyboard integrated into the cover is an excellent idea. The rest, well, we'll just have to wait and see. In the meantime, I REALLY like my iPad 3.

Setting aside my professional rant about Win8 and Metro, I have to say than, so far, the new tablet looks really nice. My main issue, compared to my iPad 3, is that I really, really love the screen of that thing: I read a lot of text on it and it really makes it much more comfortable. In fact, I bought the ipad 3 specifically because of its nicer screen.

It looks like that, on this specific element, MS's offering will fall short of Apple's gadget, at least for the first version.

I think where this fails is going to be on price. If the build quality is really so great, it's going to cost extra, and MS doesn't (yet) have the logistics and economies of scale that Apple has for the iPad. So it might eventually be really slick, but if it starts at $600 or $800, it will fail as a mass market consumer item when Androids are 1/2 or 1/3 the price, and the iPad is more desirable. On the other hand, MS could buy its way into the market with massive hardware subsidies like it did with the Xbox, but this will put MS in competition with their own hardware partners which would discourage anybody else from making Windows 8 tablets.

I think there is value in the "one OS to rule them all" concept of Windows 8, even if the execution seems to be hit or miss. Apple is taking steps in this direction as well. The end game should be that the SDKs just treat phones/tablets/desktops as different form factors, perhaps requiring different GUI layouts but otherwise sharing 95% of the same code. I do think Google needs to step up its game, Ice Cream Sandwich is decent but I'd like to see them thinking about scaling Android up to be used as a standalone desktop operating system: having multiple apps on screen at once (not just widgets), user switching, self-hosted Android development, etc, which are all things that Windows 8 will presumably support on tablets.

Umm, is anybody even reading the article? Yes, most of the details of the Surface tablets individually are less than overwhelming, but combining all these elements together into a single whole that is well machined and designed is a pretty impressive achievement. Basically what we're looking at is a device with the fit/finish and portability of an iPad, but can be deployed at a moments notice into a laptop equivalent. Besides the Apple devotees and people who instinctively bash MS, I don't think many people can really find fault with the CONCEPT of a device like this.

However, MS has a few HUGE challenges ahead of it when going into terrain like this. One, if it creates a jack of all trades device that is not very good at anything, that's a huge problem. Versatility comes at the cost of optimization. One of the ipad's strengths, is though it does only a few things, it does them very well. Mostly by simplifying the user experience to focus on key content consumption areas. MS now has the challenge of making the experience of doing many more activities on the surface tabs good enough to match what Apple has done, one that MS has not shown extraordinary skill at meeting in the past. The second big problem is battery life. iOS and Android were designed from the ground up to stretch limited battery reserves as much as possible. Windows 8 is a general PC OS, and PC's are not known for having extraordinary battery life. If MS can't get the Surface tabs to go for at least 6 or more hours while being used, and many days on standby, they're going to fail. This device's big selling point is portability. If you can't get a full day off plug, no one is going to prefer this device over a regular laptop as the strongest selling point would be eliminated. Lastly software, if MS can't get good software for this thing (and yes, I'm particularly talking about software that's designed for this hybrid work model that the Surface proposes), this thing will never take off

I'm hoping MS can overcome these challenges. Apple has become progressively more and more complacent with it's position as market leader on tablets and other portable devices. It'll be good to have another competitor in the market, especially one with as much money and mindshare as MS.

That's one of my three questions. My guess (from what I've followed about Win8) is that the Pro (Intel) version will allow for installing Linux, while the Arm version will not.

The other things I'm wondering about are price and battery life on the Pro version. If those are right (as the specs seem to indicate decent performance), and it can run Linux, then this could be pretty interesting.

Color me intrigued (in the Pro version, RT can go do rude things to itself). The ergonomics look better out-of-box for what I'd use it for - a hyper-portable *secondary* computer/tablet I can use around the home (or for light use when I'm away).

Three things I'm hoping for:- an easy way to use a wireless mouse w/ it- enough horsepower to play old games (think GoG.com)- priced around ~500USD or less